Gamer Confessional

[RangerWickett]

If you feel guilty for something you've done in a game, post it here in an sblock. I will read it and offer guidance on what you must do as penance. Then you will be forgiven, so you can go forth and game in purity.

If others read your sblock, they will be guilty as well, and they should confess.

 

[Razjah]

Father Wicket, forgive me for I have sinned. Let your ranger wisdom guide me into the purity of gaming in eternal glory.

[sblock]Father Wicket, it has been many years since I have confessed. I feel most guilty about an adventure I ran almost two years ago. It was a campaign where a kobold cult was trying to summon a demon in an E6 Pathfinder game, with extra low magic (no magic items other than scrolls and some potions). The party came to the ruined keep in the swamp and fought the kobold guardians. It was here the party paladin fell, slain by a series of unlucky rolls against his armor class. The criticals dropped his HP before any help could arrive from the party. The party then followed in-character beliefs to burn the fallen paladin in his home land. So they fled the keep.

However, I had a rule for this game that actions always had consequences. Just inside the keep in it's dungeon a group of kobolds was performing the ritual. They were stuck in the ritual and had no ways of defending themselves. But the party never entered to stop the demon. To me this meant the demon was summoned. And so I created the balrog like monster (troll with half-fiend template and some tweaking and the magic sword and whip). The demon attacked the city where the party was, and I didn't hold back. The party was brilliant, they stopped the horde of kobolds and helped the city defenders before going after the demon. But they fell. It was a TPK and they still bring it up when we talk of old campaigns. The TPK was the next session after the paladin was slain. I killed one player's characters back to back.[/sblock]

What penance must I pay, Father Wicket to relieve this burden of guilt?

 

[Oryan77]

[sblock]I kept killing the same player's PCs off unintentionally. Each time it was from situations where he really didn't have much of a chance to survive (just bad luck). I don't try to save PCs from death, but I do like to provide ways for them to survive death if they try. I'm not a big fan of save-or-die deaths.

His last PC death was the one that really made me feel guilty though. I created an encounter with a Chwidencha and there are two WotC versions of the monster in 3e (Fiend Folio & Drow of the Underdark). They both had pretty drastic differences in special abilities, but were the same CR. I couldn't decide which to choose from, so I picked the one that had the cooler abilities (DotUD).

This was simply an encounter meant to introduce a new players PC (rescue mission). The PC was the first to encounter the Chwidencha as he tried to rescue the new PC, and I killed him in 1 round (there may have also been a surprise round). It had Scuttling Charge, Pounce, Improved Grab, and Impale and then 4 attacks at +15 to hit and 1d6+6 damage each. The other version did not have those abilities and I would not have killed him in 1 round if I used it. It was supposed to be a dinky little side quest![/sblock]

 

[crazy_monkey1956]

[sblock]I gave in to player whining and begging and put a Deck of Many Things at the end of an adventure...which caused a TPR* mid-campaign.

*Total Party Reboot as one character ended up soulless, another drained of multiple levels, another alignment changed and several levels above the party average, and another just plain dead.[/sblock]

 

[GhostBear]

Forgive me Father, for I have sinned.
[sblock]I have an addiction. I am addicted to flavor-based skills. Skills that rarely, if ever, have any use in a campaign but I feel are fun to have.

Such skills include, "Doll Making", "Ancient Draconic Epic Poetry", and "Cooking: Exotic Cuisine".

Many a time has there been a skill check that I have missed by one, skill checks that might have saved another character grief, given us additional information, or discovered a secret door or trap. And sometimes I hear muttered, "If he had spent his skill points on something useful..."

There is a new game starting soon, one with wide open seas, pirates, ship battles, and buried treasure, and I am once again feeling the urge to pick an unusual skill.

This time, I am considering, "Profession: Book Binding", as my character was a book binder by trade (and used his forgery skills to make copies of expensive books which were sent to him to be rebound - so he can sell the original, and give the forgery back to the client) before deciding to, ah, "vacate the premises in search for opportunities abroad due to a hostile business environment in his current locality."

Father, what is my penance? Help me to keep from sinning again, as the urge is quite strong...[/sblock]

 

[Stumblewyk]

Forgive me Father, for I have sinned...
[sblock]My sin, Father, is vanity. I'm a proud, vain man, and I just can't help it, Father.

I can't just make the Fighter. I have to make the TWF with a bullwhip and a wooden chair for a shield. I can't make a Cleric. I have to make the "Bad-Touch" Cleric. Probably with 2 levels of Monk thrown in for "flavor". I can't just play the Paladin. I have to play the Paladin who's got a bow and never gets touched because he's Smiting Evil from the back lines. I can't even play the Wizard, because I have to play a Wizard who insists on choosing spells that benefit precisely no one, and kill exactly zero enemies. What's that? There's room for someone to play the meat-shield? How about a charging, dog-mounted halfling cavalier?

It's not that I dislike the standard party paradigm. I love it. I just...I just can't be a part of it. I blame all those years of running games and playing the vanilla version of the class a thousand times over. When I get the chance to play...to, to really play, well, I can't do it again. I have be different. I'm a Unique Snowflake, Father, and I can't help it.[/sblock]

 

[RangerWickett]

Father Wicket, forgive me for I have sinned. Let your ranger wisdom guide me into the purity of gaming in eternal glory.

What penance must I pay, Father Wicket to relieve this burden of guilt?

In penance, if you are running the same setting you must thrice invoke the memory of the paladin who fell, by letting others speak of his heroism, desiring to fight in his name, and seeing his strength as inspiration for carrying on despite grim events like demonic infestations caused by kobolds. This remembrance of a fallen PC shall be known as a Hail Larry, for Larry Elmore, who drew the death of Sturm Brightblade.

If this is not the same setting, you must twice let your party defeat NPCs that you have spent at least one hour creating the stats of. This offering of one's character creation time shall be known as an All Bother, because after all this time, we still bother to make NPCs who will die in under 30 seconds of combat.

Go in peace, and game well.

 

[RangerWickett]

The PC was the first to encounter the Chwidencha as he tried to rescue the new PC, and I killed him in 1 round (there may have also been a surprise round). It had Scuttling Charge, Pounce, Improved Grab, and Impale and then 4 attacks at +15 to hit and 1d6+6 damage each. It was supposed to be a dinky little side quest!

You are not the first to cause the death of a PC due to a misunderstanding of the balance of combat. While in the future I recommend you provide clues to your players that great dangers might lurk ahead which can kill even a mighty hero, your penance is thus:

In the next combat you run, have a lurking enemy that is neutral to the conflict between the party and their opponents. Establish its presence through narrative cues, but keep its precise location ambiguous. Then, just before the turn of an enemy that might cause grievous harm to a PC, have the lurker strike that enemy and distract its attention, to grant the PC a reprieve.

This shall be known as the Gory Be, for battles shall be gory, but it is our duty as game masters to punish the NPCs from time to time, not just the PCs.

Go in peace, and game well.

 

[RangerWickett]

Total Party Reboot

Mass turnover of characters is a serious concern when it occurs without drama. If your players still talk fondly of the ill fortune they received, some good may have come of this tragedy. Indeed, the Dice Gods work in mysterious ways.

You seem to have confessed to 'giving in' to your players' 'whining.' While there might be deeper issues here, for this minor sin I ask you to Praise Odd: gather a set of polyhedral dice -- or any seven dice used for your game system of choice -- polish them, then set them to odd numbers. Do this in remembrance that randomness exists in our games, and that we must tread a narrow path between chaos and railroading.

Go in peace, and game well.

 

[Scott DeWar]

Forgive father for I have sinned,

[sblock=all others keep out!] I have never been to confession. I have dark evil thoughts dwelling on the joy of long torturous deaths of pcs[/sblock]